John chapter 5. As we've been going through the
book of John, we looked last week when our Lord said, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, the Son of Man can do nothing of Himself
but what He seeth the Father do. for whatsoever things he
doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise." Those men were mad
at him. The Jews sought the more to kill him, not only because
he broke the Sabbath, not just because he had healed this man
at that pool and told him, take up your bed and walk. And that
man obeyed God because he believed him and he did what he said.
He said, not just because he broke the Sabbath, but that he
was making himself equal with God. And the Lord Jesus Christ
replies to him, you make yourself equal with God, is what they're
saying. And he says, let me make this verily, verily clear. I
am God. That's what he told them. He
didn't him haul around. He didn't skirt the bush. He didn't go
round about way of explaining it. He met them head on. And
he said, the Son can't do nothing but the Father. People say, well,
and whenever Christ said, I come to this earth not to do mine
own will, but the will of Him that sent me. People say, well,
there's two wills there. No, it's not. That's one. His will
is the same as the Father's. Both of them are one. They're
the same. He's not a complete separate entity that has a different
desire. He desires what the Father desires.
Well, the Father loves Him. He loves the Father. But this
evening, I want to look at one verse. Verse 24. And I want us
to go back to grade school. I pray I can be very simple,
and I pray that I can be very plain. And in my text, the Lord
Jesus Christ gives us a powerful truth. It's a triple truth. He says, Verily, verily, I say
unto you. And He does this in a single
compound sentence. It ain't hard to miss, is it? Doesn't mean to say, well, He
could have meant this. Well, He could have meant that. Well, you ain't
going to miss this one. He's going to tell us one sentence.
He says there in verse 24, John 5, 24, Verily, verily, I say
unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on me, on
him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into
condemnation, but is passed from death unto life. There's many
aspects of the gospel. There's many things for us to
learn and for us to understand. On this earth, while we walk
in this body of death, while we're here, we're not going to
understand it all and we're not going to learn it all. It ain't
going to happen. We're going to see through that
glass darkly, dimly. We ain't going to get a good
hold on everything. But our Lord never corrected a person's entire
theological position in one go, did He? He taught one thing at
a time. He taught one thing at a time.
He said in John 16, I have yet many things to say unto you,
but you cannot bear them now. Boy, we think we can bear them,
don't we? I can handle it. I want to learn some more. No,
we can't. Christ said, God said, you can't handle it now. He says,
how be it when He, the Spirit of Truth, God the Holy Ghost
has come, He will guide you into all truth. You're going to know
all truth. You're going to see Christ in
all things because He's going to guide you, little by little. He'll
take you by the hand and escort you right through this, right
to Christ, right to truth. That's the way He's going to
take you. A person's not born grown up. We know that. We have
babies. We have children. They're little. But your body,
you grow. And you grow in understanding.
You grow in knowledge. You learn how to speak. You learn the language.
You grow in understanding and wisdom. And you grow in maturity
as a human being, don't you? We can see that left and right.
One of God's children, they're not born of flesh and blood,
but they're born of God and the Spirit of God. And just like
that physical example we have, We have all around us. You're
not born at 55 years old in Christ. We're babes in Christ. That's
how you come in. We all come in the same. There's
life, but it's got a long way to go. It's part of the family. It's loved by those in the family. It's looked after. It's fed.
Someone defends it. But if there's life, there is
growth. If there's life, there's growth. And it takes a lifetime
to reach maturity. That growth's painful sometimes,
but if there's life, there's growth. Anything that's alive,
it grows. We went and looked at them big
old trees up north. And they grow so high, and they stop growing
high. And then they grow out so far, and then they'll stop
growing out. But if they're alive, there's still fruit, there's
still leaves coming every year, isn't there? There's growth.
If it's alive, there's growth. This is potent at my moment right
here. This is wood. That's the same wood that's growing
out there, but this ain't growing. This is dead. It doesn't produce
anything. It doesn't grow. It's dead. You
get that? That tree's alive. There's growth.
In what's dead, there's no growth. The main objective of our Lord's
ministry and work on this earth is laid out here in one verse.
And the proof of that work is laid out. And the results of
that work is laid out. He came to give life to dead
sinners. That's where it hits us. He came
to honor the Father. He came to fulfill the law. He
came to do all those things. But in doing so, He came to give life to dead
sinners. He said in John 10, The thief cometh not, but to
steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I am come that they might have
life, and that they might have it more abundantly. Oh, His abundance
is something. He came to save His people from
their sin. He came to give them life abundant.
Eternal life is what He came to give them. And where there's
life, there is evidence of life. Just like those trees, just like
children, just like honeybees, just like anything. If there's
life, there's evidence of life. And where God does a work, there's
a work that's been done. He don't make a painting in invisible
ink. If you're His workmanship, there's proof there. God's sheep
will hear our Lord's Word tonight, and I pray He comforts their
heart. I hope He speaks comfortably to their heart. Others may listen
and be angry. Others may listen and even take
notes. I didn't get these flip-flops.
I was talking on the way here. I'm pretty tired. I'm pretty
worn out this week. I think I got that completely
backwards in my notes. There are note-taking goats. Did you
know that? There's goats that take notes. I've watched it happen. They're chameleons. There's people
that come in and they hear these things and they get these checklists
of what believers do and they memorize them and they regurgitate
it and you think there's a sheep. They blend right in. They play
both sides of the fence. We'd read that in our script
reading in Luke 6. It says, Woe unto you when all men shall speak
well of you for so did their fathers to the false prophets.
people Christ is talking about there, they brag on you the same
as they brag on the false prophets. There's no difference in them.
They get along just as fine here as they get along just as fine
everywhere else. Nobody hates them. They just sit down and
ain't nobody against them. My brother Darwin Pruitt recently
preached on that passage we read. He said, they say enough to be
commended by believers, but they leave off enough so as not to
offend the world. They really don't say anything. They're friends with everybody.
This is going to be plain and true, what we're going to look
at tonight. This isn't something to be misconstrued. It's not
something that we can say the kind of the right thing close
enough to get along with everybody. Our Lord's plain. He says in
verse 24, Verily, verily, I say unto you, unto you, 113 times in this Holy Scripture,
the word barely is used. In 25 occasions, there's 25 different
verses in the book of John. I think I'm going to go through
them maybe here in two weeks, but I've got to keep it down
to a minute, a minute of verse. Twenty-five verses in John, and
this is the only book out of 66 books that the Lord uses,
is barely, barely. He says barely throughout. But
in John, He says barely, barely. What a precious thing. What attention
we should give that. The Hebrew word means true faithfulness,
and it means amen. The Greek word for verily means
firm, trustworthy, sure, and amen. He says, amen, amen, I
speak unto you. We do just the exact opposite,
don't we? We see the promises of God, we speak of the promises
of God to one another, and His words, His faithfulness, His
truth, and then we say Amen after. He ain't like us. God in human
flesh is speaking here, and He says Amen before He speaks. That's
how sure it is. That's how true it is. That's
how faithful and trustworthy it is. The great I Am says Amen. And it's right because He says
it. We don't take what we think is right and lay God down next
to it and see if He matches up. We check what we think is right
against Him. He's the one that is right. He doesn't say what's
right, what He says is right. It's because He said it. Can
we pay attention to what He has to say? He says, Verily, verily,
I say unto you, He that heareth my word, comma, He that heareth
my word. Life's not given because of baptism.
Eternal life's not given because you take an infant and sprinkle
water on it, or because you take an adult and you scare them to
death from hell and get them to get into a baptistry, or because
they get a little pledge card, or because of some nonsense.
It doesn't come by water. Life's not given by religious
ceremony. I have a dedication time, and every day I give 15
minutes to God, so that means I'm alive. No. by devoting a
certain amount of time a day to a good cause. I work at a
charity or you go into a box and you confess your sin to a
man that separates you from God. No, that's not right. Life's
not given because of church attendance. I never miss church service.
That's not how you get life. Life's not given by sacraments.
You know what sacraments are? We don't hand out sacraments
when we take the Lord's Supper. I call them elements. Sacraments
is something that imparts grace. And people think if you take
this physically and you eat this physical bread and you drink
this physical wine, that somehow grace has then entered into you.
I did something, I took the Lord's table and I didn't die right
then. So I must be, He must have given me some life. I chose to
get life for myself. That's not it. You can eat the
Lord's supper, not the Lord's dinner. You can eat the Lord's
supper until you have a heart attack and it ain't going to
put life in you. But He did say in John 6, didn't He? He says,
Verily, verily, I say unto you, except ye eat of the flesh of
the Son of Man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you. How do we feed on Christ? His
Word. We feed on His Word. His Word
to us. Life's not given by seeing a
supposed image of Christ on a bagel. That was a big thing a couple
of years ago, wasn't it? I'd see Mother Mary in a piece of toast
or something. And I'd say, well, I must be a child of God. He
sent this to me. I got a fortune cookie or some
nonsense. It's not seeing a statue cry tears of blood. I saw a great
miracle. I saw this wonderful thing happen.
I saw clouds in the sky. It's not given by obedience to
the law. Well, we'd all be in trouble if it was. If he said,
verily, verily, I say unto you, if you keep my law, you'll live.
Every one of us is going to die. You ain't going to make judgment.
It ain't going to work out. It doesn't say that a person
has an experience, a dream, a wooshy-gooshy warm feeling, that they have
eternal life. It says, he that heareth my word,
he that heareth my word, not some word, not any old word,
He that heareth my word." That's who's going to have life. Turn
over Jeremiah 23. We'll look at it. I've heard
a lot of people say throughout the years, I mean a bunch of
them, and they say, well, I was saved. I have no idea what they're
preaching. It may have been not totally
right. That's how they phrase it. They don't know if it's truth
or it's a lie, but whenever I was brought to know the doctrines
of grace later, I was saved, but then I came to learn about
this Christ fellow people talk about. Or some will say their
children have moved off. Well, they're not attending a
church that preaches the truth always. They're not really preaching
it, but I'm just glad they're in church. I ain't. I'd be better
off at a football game. Look here in Jeremiah 23, verse
28. The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream. And he
that hath my word, Let him speak my word faithfully, nothing else. What is the chaff to the wheat,
saith the Lord? It's not my word like a fire,
saith the Lord, like a hammer that breaketh the rock into pieces.
Isn't that what his word does to your heart? If he's done a
work in you, didn't it crush you? Didn't it just shatter you
and tear you all to pieces and you just cried out, God save
me. I have no hope of myself, I'm shattered. Therefore, behold,
I am against the prophets, saith the Lord, that steal my words,
every one from his neighbor." They just say what they heard.
Behold, I am against the prophets, saith the Lord, that use their
tongues and say he saith. He's against the prophets that
use their mouths. He didn't use their mouth. They're
not his mouthpiece. But they're saying, oh, God wants
this, God says that, God thinks this, and he's trying. Behold,
I am against them that prophesy false dreams, saith the Lord,
and do tell them, and cause my people to err by their lives
and by their likeness. Yet I sent them not. nor commanded
them. The Lord didn't send them. Therefore,
they shall not profit this people much. That ain't what it says,
is it? They shall not profit this people at all. Kevin, I
don't think that's fair. Saith the Lord. Can a man be
saved underneath a false gospel? Don't matter what Kevin Thacker
thinks. God says no. It will not profit my people.
It ain't gonna do it. Our Lord said, He that heareth
My word, not that somebody that listened to a message, or somebody
that heard an evangelist. You know what? I listened to
that certain preacher. Everybody likes that one preacher. Everybody knows
them. He wrote a bunch of books. I've been underneath him. I heard
him preach four or five times. I liked hearing him. I liked
listening to him. Oh, he's loud. Not he that readeth the word.
I read the Bible every day. There's people. Wasn't Nicodemus
a teacher, a ruler, an expert in Israel? He that heareth, he
that heareth my word, the truth, is who's going to have eternal
life. Isaiah 55 verse 3 says, incline your ear and come unto
me, hear and your soul shall live. That eunuch was reading away,
wasn't he? Reading out loud. Here come Philip. He said, you know what you're
talking about? He said, how could I? You know, what verse could
have been plainer? He didn't get it. He had to hear,
didn't he? Not just physical ears, though that comes. He had
to hear in his heart. Christ had to speak to his heart.
There's evidence of those that hear the Lord.
There's evidence to it. The Lord spoke to Lazarus, didn't
He? Lazarus, come forth! Then Lazarus
said, Boy, I heard you. He got up and came forth, didn't
He? He obeyed the Word of God. Samuel. The Lord came to Samuel
by night. He said, Samuel, Samuel. He went
and woke Eli up. He said, what do you want? He said, I don't
want you. Go back to bed, son. You're bothering me. Get out
of here. He went back to bed. Samuel, Samuel. He heard it.
And he came to Eli again. Eli, what do you want? I keep
hearing you call my name. He said, son, that ain't me. That's
the Lord calling you. Boy, couldn't we learn something from that?
Kevin, you're picking on me. You're shooting arrows at me.
What Eli tells Samuel, that's God talking to you. If it's according
to his word, it ain't me. That's the Lord talking to you.
Then he come a third time. Samuel, Samuel. And he said,
here's your servant, Lord. I hear you. Tell me what to do. I hear you. He didn't know God
before. It says he didn't know God. It
was directed to the Lord by the Lord's prophet. And he heard.
He heard. Went to go call on a man by the
name of Saul of Tarsus. God's prophet said, I don't really
want to go down there. I know about this man. Are you
sure, Lord? I'll go. But he said, behold, he prayeth. He prayeth. Now he's able to,
isn't he? He wasn't before. Paul worked this backwards. He
did what we used to call backwards planning in the military. Let's
look at it over in Romans 10. Romans chapter 10, beginning
verse 13. Romans 10 and 13, for whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. You're going
to call on Him. Those that believe the Word,
those that have heard Him, heard His voice, they will call on
Him. Verse 14, how then shall they
call on Him and whom they have not believed? You've got to believe
in Him and call on Him. And how shall they believe in
Him and whom they have not heard? You can't believe unless you've
heard something. And how shall they hear without a preacher?
Somebody's got to tell you this. You can't figure it out on your
own. You ain't going to sit down with the Bible and something
else and read it and, well, I've got some insight. There ain't
no apostles nowadays. Men's out writing their own epistles,
these general letters to the public and thinking God spoke
to them. They're heinous liars. And how shall they preach except
they be sent? The foolishness of preaching.
That's one mercy beggar telling another mercy beggar where he
found bread. God used a sinful earthen vessel that you can find
a whole lot of dirt on and you ain't gonna look far. And He
saved him by grace to come tell others, say, God saved me by
grace. Yeah, but I'm bad. Me too. And He saved sinners.
That's who He came to save. People say, that's foolishness.
I can figure this out on my own. God says no. Verse 17. So then faith, that believing,
that believing on Him, cometh by hearing and hearing by the
Word of God. He that heareth my word. But
I say, have they not heard? And everybody heard this, don't
we put it out? We're in 27 countries and 17,000 downloads and everything
else. Ain't enough people heard this? So faith comes by hearing
and hearing by the word of God. But I say, have they not heard?
Yes, verily, their sound went into all the earth and their
words unto the end of the world. People listen. People listen
to the gospel. People listen to music too, don't
they? And it goes in one ear and out the other. But very few
people hear. Whole mass of people listen to
the gospel. Millions, however many. Few people hear. I wonder
how many people have truly heard the Word of the Lord. How many
have heard Christ the Word? I mean heard Him, not just listened
to Him, not said, well, that's okay. I don't disagree with that
logically and according to my checklist and my deductive reasoning,
it matches the scriptures, but they heard a person in their
heart. He spoke to their heart. If they
have, there's proof. They believe. They believe. Turn over 1 Thessalonians 1.
There's proof of that hearing. There's proof of that believing.
1 Thessalonians 1. Verse 4, 1 Thessalonians 1 verse 4, Knowing,
brethren beloved, your election of God, period. How did Paul
know that? For our gospel came not unto
you in word only, not just a man talking, not just something somebody
could hear, but in power, also in power, and in the Holy Ghost,
and in much assurance, as ye know what manner of men we were
among you for your sake. And ye became followers of us
and of the Lord. How could you follow a man? Well,
if that man's following the Lord, we're walking side by side, ain't
we? Having received the word, In much affliction, boy, it's
painful. It's painful. It burns, it crushes,
it hurts when we see ourselves. When God truly convicts us of
sin, if God the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, that's going to be
bloody. This ain't something we're going to blow up a kiddie
pool and start dunking people left and right. And everybody's saying,
kumbaya, there's going to be some pain and some tears coming.
Much affliction with joy of the Holy Ghost. Boy, that pain, that
balm of Gilead comes right in, don't it? That healing comes
in. "...so that ye were examples
to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia. For from you sounded
out the word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia and Achaia,
but also in every place your faith to God were to spread abroad,
so that we need not speak anything." I ain't got to tell nobody about
that. The Lord's people know that He
saved you. "...for they themselves show
of us what manner of entering we had into you, and how ye turned
to God from idols." to serve the living and true God. What
else? And to wait for His Son from
heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered
us from the wrath to come. You wait for that one that saved
you. You wait for that first love that come to you and loved
you first. And you look for Him. I've said that a lot lately.
They say, Kevin, you've got two months to live. Good, I'm going
to see my Lord. Maybe He'll still come in the
next month. Maybe He'll still come tomorrow. Look for Him. Wait for Him. That one we first
loved. Look over in chapter 2, verse 13. 1 Thessalonians 2.13. For this cause also thank we
God without ceasing, because when ye received the word of
God which ye heard, Of us, ye received it not as the word of
men, but as it is in the truth." It's not just because some man
said it. It's not because I'm a witness, but you heard it in
truth. Christ spoke to you. The word of God, which effectually
worketh also in you that believe. All those are present participles. It's he that heareth, he that
believeth, he hath, it worketh. Because it ain't a once go. I
was 12 years old and the Lord saved me. And I believed Him.
Well, what about now? This ain't a life insurance policy
you pay one time for and you're good. That's not a whole life
policy. This is something you believe on. Believeeth. You heareth. Because you heard it once, you've
got to hear it again. It ain't like that raven that can leave
the ark and never come back and be fine. That's that dove that
has to come back. And it comes back to that olive
branch in its mouth with nothing but peace. Peace. Christ our
peace. It's all it's on its mouth. It
has to. Back in our text from John 5. Verse 24 says, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word and believeth
on him that sent me hath everlasting life. I don't have time to give
this example really, but I don't get too excited about dead folks. Down there in Mayfield, Kentucky
right now, Kimberly's aunt and uncle, they train search dogs
for FEMA. And they're down there looking for dead bodies on that
candle factory. And they got lights and sirens
and bullhorns and technology. Oh, they got infrared, forward-looking
infrared, looking for people and stuff like that. And they're
pulling out dead bodies. It just reminds me of religion.
And they're taking those cold, dead bodies and they're cleaning
up those cold, dead bodies and putting clothes on them and they're
lining up next to all the other cold, dead bodies. And that's
how they are. They're cold, clean, and dead.
Looks good on the outside, don't it? And they got a lot of bells
and whistles going on. A lot of things. That's just dead works
religion. That don't excite me. Don't excite
me at all. I don't get pumped up about that.
It hurts me. It saddens me. But if they was
to go through all that rubble, and they just heard a cry, help!
Save me! Ooh! Well, we can get excited
now because there's life. There's life. Do I believe God? Why did our Lord say, believe
on Him that sent me? He says later in John, verily,
verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me hath everlasting
life. We looked at this last week.
They're one, ain't they? They're one and the same. The three are
one. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are the triune
God. And when Christ said, I come down and do my will, not my own
will, but the will of Him that sent me, doesn't mean they have
different wills. It means they're one and the same. He that hears
my word and believes hath everlasting life. If I believed God, and
He said, if I believed Him, and He said, ten seconds from now
there's going to be a big ant that will fall through this roof
right here. But I'd say, yes Lord. A chicken's got a head that big
and got enough sense to get out of the rain, don't it? Call it
an implied task. If you believe the Lord, You
obey Him. You answer His Word. Man's responsibility
is our response to His ability. Our response to His Word. And
we believe Him. We believe Him. Noah was given
a new heart because God was gracious to him. And God spoke to him.
And he believed God. And the Lord said, Noah, build
an ark. And what did Noah do? He went and built an ark. He
said, My sheep hear my voice. I know them. I love them. And
they follow me. What's the sheep do? They follow
the shepherd. They do it, don't they? Abraham
believed God. He didn't just believe in God. The devil believes
in God. He believed God and it was counted
to him from righteousness. And he was out there in Ur, Ur
the Chaldees, and the Lord spoke to him and said, pack up and
get to walking. And Abraham packed up and got to walking. Then years
later, he had a real trial of his life. His only son. And the
Lord said, in that there is where your seed is going to come from.
Look out and count those stars. That's going to be your seed.
Now, take that son, take him up on a hill just like your heathen
parents did, and kill him. I want you to sacrifice him to
me. And Abraham grabbed that boy and started walking up the
hill. People mocked him, made fun of him. What you doing? Oh,
he's turned back to works. I don't know what Abraham's doing.
He didn't care. Would that hurt that boy? It's going to cause
some pain, isn't it? It's going to kill him quick,
but it's going to hurt. But he believed God. What was going
to happen? He didn't know. God was going
to raise him or... He didn't know what was going
to happen, but he believed God and he acted on it, didn't he? He got to walking.
Why is a believer baptized? Why do we get baptized? They
believe the Word of God. Not just what's written down
in a book somewhere. They believe Christ. That's why
they're baptized. Why do we take His supper? He
says, after you do this in remembrance of Me, because we remember Him,
who we've heard, who we believe, who we trust on. He says in verse
24, Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word,
and believeth on Him that sent Me, they're one and the same,
hath, H-A-T-H, present participle, right now. Not you could have
it, not you might have it, you may have it someday, hath. everlasting
life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from
death unto life." What's that everlasting life? It's quality,
not quantity. Man's worried about the quantity
of it. How long is this going to last?
I can't count that high. No, it's the quality of it. It's
the life of who gave it to you. That's what's so special about
that everlasting life. You can listen to His Word, you can believe
in God, and you can have everlasting damnation. What is it whenever you hear
Him and you believe Him? You hath right now and forevermore. That's why you got ears to hear.
That's why you have the faith to believe. That's what believing
is. It's faith. You hath everlasting life right
now. You heareth. You believeth. You
trusteth on Him. It doesn't change. It doesn't
come and go. What's that going to mean if somebody hears the
Lord? Not listens to Him. If they hear Him. What happens
if they believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and not just believe that
the man came here, but I believe Him. I believe what He says.
And I do what He says. I want to be an obedient child
because I love Him. What's going to happen? That'll mean more
to you than your spouse. That'll mean more to you than
your parents. That'll mean more to you than them precious little
children you've got sitting right there. I've seen people leave churches,
I mean, several times, because somebody offended their children. I guess they never heard of I'm
sorry or an apology. Sort these things out, what's
wrong with you? Mom used to make us hug. Did y'all ever have to
hug? Me and my siblings, she said,
if y'all knock it out, we'll make y'all hug. I hugged a bunch. I'm a
hugger now. People leave it, get mad. Well,
you said my mommy and daddy ain't in heaven right now. I didn't
say that. The Lord may have said it to you. It may have been Him
speaking. I may have been like, Eli, it's the Lord that's speaking.
That's why I can't listen to that. Maybe you just listened. You didn't hear. If you hear
Him, if you believe Him, that's the most important thing that
will ever be everlastingly. I hope them other things don't
happen. I hope I don't lose my family and my friends. I've lost
a bunch of them already. But the most important thing
will be Him. It'll be a person. What's the promise to those given
life? Those that have ears to hear,
the faith to believe. It says they shall not come into
condemnation. A better translation of that
is judgment. You ain't gonna come into judgment. And let me
tell you, people don't understand what judgment is, you don't want
no part of it. to the children of God, you ain't
gonna see judgment. You scared to die? Scared to have all your
sins laid out there and have to answer for them? Your blood
won't do. Your works won't do. Throw it out the window. If you face judgment, if you
die and meet a holy God, you ain't gonna make it. But those
that hear Him, those that believe Him, those that have everlasting
life, there's no judgment. You ain't going to come into
it. It's done. How could that be? How could that be? If all
of mankind outside of Christ is going to be at this throne
of judgment that Christ is going to sit on, how do I get around
that? How could that be? But they're
passed from death. judgment settled in Christ unto
life. How did that happen? Man lives
right here in this world. This microphone's judgment and
here's eternal life. You're going to come through,
you're going to meet that judgment and you're going to go to eternal
damnation, condemnation. But when Christ came here, He
was made His people and He satisfied the wrath of God. He satisfied
the justice and judgment of God, the Holy God for His people,
our substitute That's done. I forgot to look up. Jeffrey Dahmer's a good one.
I was thinking of a serial killer or something. Right now, you go
to Jeffrey Dahmer and you charge him with everything he's done
wrong. You go out to him and read. Everybody he ever killed,
everything he ever done, every red light he ever run. There
ain't no charge to him. Why? He's dead. Judgment's over. He can't be punished again. There's
no double jeopardy. Christ bore the sin of His people. He bore the wrath of God for
His people. He bore the judgment and the guilt for His people.
And because of that, we've passed. From death in this world, He
came to us, spoke to us, gave us life, must be born again,
gave us ears to hear, faith to believe Him, perseverance, faith
to believe Him, faith to live in this world, and faith to die
looking to Him. You're going to wake up and you're
going to start living. That's when we're going to be alive.
We're in the womb right now, womb of this world. We're going
to come to an everlasting eternity in the face of His likeness,
being conformed to His image. What a thought that'd be. Who
gets a glory for that one sentence? Verily, verily, I say unto you,
and none can say any, He that heareth my word, and believeth
on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into
condemnation, but is passed from death unto life." Work's done. I just want to praise Him, do
you? I want to thank Him. My heart's broke. Look at how
much He loved us. One that's so worthy of praise.